Harry Reid’s favorite Republican: John McCain

Last Thursday, the nuclear option seemed inevitable — until Harry Reid started speaking with a man he once said he couldn’t stand: John McCain.

It was the same day that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell warned that Reid would go down as the worst Senate majority leader “ever” if he made good on his nuclear option threat. But behind the scenes, Reid and McCain — working with Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, John Hoeven of North Dakota, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and the two Tennessee GOP senators, Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker, as well as Democrat Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) — negotiated throughout the weekend and into Tuesday morning before reaching a deal on confirming executive branch nominees.

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Reid: Immigration still ahead of us

It was those talks that yielded a deal to stop the historic and hugely controversial rules change.

As the relationship between McConnell and Reid has deteriorated in recent months — and especially during the past few weeks — a new band of GOP senators led by McCain has stepped in to fill the void. Three times this year, including on immigration, guns and now the nuclear-option fight, McCain has become the Republican whom Reid now trusts more than any other. The bloc of GOP senators could emerge as crucial deal makers as the Senate and White House move onto budget battles in the fall.

During the most consequential period of filibuster negotiations — right before a 3½-hour Monday night session with all senators and into the early hours of Tuesday morning — Reid and McConnell spoke just three times, according to sources familiar with the situation. And before McCain and Reid went to the floor Tuesday to announce the deal, McConnell personally asked the majority leader in his office to hold off on using the nuclear option in the future.

Reid wouldn’t make that commitment, sources said, partially because he and Schumer had won over McCain and the GOP bloc of senators. Schumer joked that he spoken to McCain “30 times” during the weekend, even when he was out town at a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee event.

“I don’t know how many times I’ve talked to Harry over the last several days,” Corker said Tuesday, “but [Republican] leadership has been very aware of what’s happened.”

On Tuesday, these GOP senators dismissed talk that they were emerging as the new power players in the Senate with the ability to work their will with or without the support of McConnell and his leadership team. But it was clearly evident that the senators, and McCain in particular, had the sway to bring GOP votes across the aisle and solve a serious institutional issue — even if McConnell wasn’t taking the lead role negotiating a deal.

“We have a long history,” McCain said of his relationship with Reid. “We have had our clashes and our words that we wish we hadn’t [said] about each other. But there’s a bond that’s very deep and long between us.”

McCain and the other GOP senators insisted that it was a team effort — and that McConnell was kept apprised of the negotiations.

McConnell said in an interview that he had called on the White House to remove two contentious National Labor Relations Board nominees months ago but had been ignored. Now, he said, Reid had agreed to his proposal.

“This is what I’ve called for for six months, and I think it’s a logical solution to the problem,” McConnell told POLITICO. “Send up two nominees who were not unconstitutionally appointed. I’m glad they’re going to do that. It makes a lot of sense, and it’s a good way to resolve the conflict.”